Full sail dating

Characterized by a relatively high bow, exaggerated sheer and shallow draft, often setting a single lugsail.

Cocca: Mediterranean equivalent for the Northern European cog.

Down Easter: A square-rigged merchant vessel combining large carrying capacity with a relatively sharp hull.

They got their name from having been built in Maine, downwind and east of all the major East Coast ports, and were being used largely for the California grain trade (1865-1890).

Clipper: A variety of square-rigged speed-built merchant ships built between 17.

Often thought of as some of the most beautiful and elegant sailing vessels ever built.

A cog is characterised by high sides, a relatively flat bottom, rounded bilge and a single square sail. Corvette: Smallest of all the three-masted square-rigged sailing warships. Also called a 'sloop-of-war', and could be classified as a small frigate. Cutters were the ships of choice for English smugglers during the 18th century.

The largest were up to 150 tons burden and could carry up to 12 guns.

Even though the usual clinker construction limited the ultimate size of a cog, the English chronicler Thomas Walsingham speaks of great cogs in 1331 with three decks and over 500 crew and soldiers. A fast-sailing fore-and-aft rigged single-masted vessel usually setting double headsails, used for patrol and dispatch services.

Lightly armed, they were not well-suited for dealing with pirates, privateers or any other armed opposition. Frigate: A three-masted sailing warship with two full decks, with only one gun deck.

A frigate was armed with between 30 to 44 guns located on the gun deck and possibly some on the quarter-deck and forecastle.

Bilander: A small two-masted merchant sailing ship, similar to a brigantine, used mainly on Dutch coastal routes and canals. She carried a fore-and-aft lateen main-sail bent to a yard hanging at about 45 degrees to the mast.

In the age of sail, boats were essential equipment on any ship.

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Bomb Vessel: Developed by the French to battle the Barbary corsairs, these vessels used high trajectory mortars instead of conventional guns.